In this episode, host Caryl Westmore interviews Kim Speed, a brand visibility expert and host of the Employee to Entrepreneur Society. Kim shares her journey from corporate advertising executive to entrepreneur, sparked by the 2008-2009 recession when she lost her job. This unexpected change allowed her to spend more time with her children and realize the importance of work-life balance.
Key Points Discussed:
• The difference between brand and branding: Brand is about perception, emotion, and reputation, while branding involves logos, colors, and visual elements.
- Essential steps for new entrepreneurs:
- Figure out your service offering and expertise
- Show up authentically without perfection
- Choose comfortable ways to be visible
- Marketing Strategies:
- Focus on one social media platform where you’re comfortable
- Build an email list to own your audience
- Create valuable content and engage with your community
- Consider collaborative marketing through partnerships
- Monetization Methods:
- One-on-one services
- Course creation
- Group coaching
- Affiliate marketing, including the Amazon Influencer program
Kim emphasizes that success in business requires three crucial elements:
1. Building an email list
2. Joining a supportive community
3. Finding ways to become profitable early on
The conversation highlights the importance of authenticity in business, with Kim sharing how she initially feels pressure to maintain a corporate image but learns that people connect more with genuine personalities. She also discusses various visibility strategies, emphasizing that entrepreneurs should choose methods that feel natural and sustainable rather than just following trends.
A significant portion of the discussion focuses on alternative income streams, particularly the Amazon Influencer program, which Kim teaches through her Creator for Profit course. This program allows content creators with established social media presence to earn money through short-form video content.
The episode concludes with practical advice for finding Kim’s resources, including her Facebook group (The Employee to Entrepreneur Society) and LinkedIn profile. Throughout the conversation, both host and guest emphasize the importance of building genuine relationships and creating value while developing a sustainable business model.
This episode provides valuable insights for authors, coaches, and entrepreneurs looking to build their brand while maintaining authenticity and creating multiple income streams.
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TRANSCRIPT
Kim: I had made the decision that this is great. I want to be an entrepreneur. I want to have the freedom of my time and how much money I make and who I work with. And as my business development was drying up, I had to make a choice. And I had to figure out how to become, I call it a real business. And luckily I was able to find a community of people just at the right time.
Caryl: Hello and welcome to the Write the Book Inside You podcast. Tips, tools and interviews for coaches and healers like you who want to write a non-fiction book to boost your visibility, clients and cash flow while making a difference. I’m your host, Caryl Westmore, a multi-published author and energy psychology tapping book coach. Now let’s jump into today’s episode.
My guest today Kim Speed is a brand visibility expert and host of the Employee to Entrepreneurial Society. Our paths crossed on Facebook, and along the lines of me being an author who wants to pick her brains about how we can be a personal, powerful brand as writers and authors. Welcome Kim.
Kim: Hi Caryl, it’s so great to be here. Thank you for having me.
Caryl: Yes, it’s great that you have a mission and that is to explain to people about personal branding and about marketing. And I wondered where this came from, what your background is, to make you an expert here.
Kim: So, Caryl, 15 years ago, I actually started my own business. But before that, I was in the world of advertising. I was a creative director. I worked on global brands from Coca Cola, Ford, TD Bank, lots of great clients. We had a great time. But then in 2008, 2009, we actually went through the recession and we lost a lot of our big clients. So I found myself without a job. But I did not ever think that I was going to be an entrepreneur, Caryl. I never thought that. It wasn’t even in my vocabulary. I didn’t grow up thinking that way. I always thought you worked for somebody and you just took the steps to go forward and get ahead that way.
But when I was – I call it a gift – when I was gifted with not having a job, I went home and I just started putting my resume together and networking with people and making connections. I also had the opportunity to be at home with my children who were young at the time. And I had an epiphany of how much of their lives I actually was missing by going and working at this corporate job. And all of a sudden I was able to walk them to school and I was part of their lives. I was taking them to events. I knew all their friends. I was having their friends over and it was just so joyous that I knew that this was a sign that I needed to change things.
Although I loved being in corporate and I loved that industry that I was in, it was time for a change because family was more important to me. That’s one of my biggest values – family and connection. So without a real plan, Caryl, I actually jumped in and said, “I’m going to have a business and I’m going to help people.”
I was so fortunate that it turned out really well for the first couple of years because I had a network of people that were able to hire me freelance in consulting. But my biggest problem was that I didn’t spend time doing new business. So eventually that starts to wear thin. But at that point, I had made the decision that this is great. I want to be an entrepreneur. I want to have the freedom of my time and how much money I make and who I work with.
And as my business development was drying up, I had to make a choice. And I had to figure out how to become, I call it a real business. And luckily, I was able to find a community of people just at the right time. Other people who were small business entrepreneurs, and they found a coach, and I found mentors, and I found a group of people that just supported me. And I was able to actually figure out all of the pieces that I was missing in my business, the things that I didn’t know. Yes, I knew marketing and branding, but I didn’t know how to build a business. I didn’t know the finances behind it. So I met those people and I was able to turn things around.
That is why it is so important to me now that I have the society, the Employee to Entrepreneur Society, because I know there are so many people out there that have many gifts, so much knowledge and talent to offer people, but they may not necessarily know how to turn that into a business.
Caryl: Exactly, so you found that that was your key to success and if you were to tell a brand new person in your position who may have small children and wants to start her own business, may not even be transitioning from corporate, what are the three key things you would point out that they must do? Because I think one of the things we had always told is don’t spend all your money on a fancy website. What is in this day and age, 2024 and going into 2025, what are the three things we should focus on as an individual entrepreneur or personal brand?
Kim: Well, it’s great that you asked that because one of the things that actually occurred to me when I was doing branding for businesses – ’cause I started off doing branding and design and websites. And that’s where my focus was, but I really found that small business owners who I knew I could tell were really struggling with the fact that they were going out there and they were saying, “I wanna create a logo and I want to build my website,” but they didn’t have the content. They didn’t understand who they were. So one of the big things that I help people with now is to figure out the brand versus branding. So let me explain. There is…
Caryl: That’s interesting because we need to know, “Oh, is that my branding? Is that my brand? What does this mean to people who aren’t necessarily, you know, from the world of advertising.
Kim: Yes, yes. And it can be very confusing because people will say, “You need to build a brand, you need to build a brand.” And the first thing that they think of when they think of brand or branding, they think of a logo, they think of their colors and their fonts, and they think of, you know, the pretty pictures they’re gonna put on their website and how it’s gonna look so great. And they think that’s gonna build their business or that that is building their business. But that is not, that is what I call branding.
And the difference is that you need to build a brand first. A brand is different than your branding, a brand. It is a perception, it’s an emotion, a feeling that people have of you. It’s an experience someone has and remembers when they work with you. It’s how someone would describe you to a friend if you weren’t there. In essence, your brand equates to your reputation and that is really what is so important. You are building your reputation. And when you start a business, some people will come to me and say, “Do I work on brand right away?” And I will say to them, “As soon as you hang out your shingle and say you are in business or want to be an author or you have a product or service that you’re considering selling, you have created a brand.”
Caryl: Exactly. Okay, so when you say “want to be an author,” usually what I teach is that being an author is part of your service – it’s distilling what you do into a book that also leverages your authority and authenticity. So although you won’t necessarily tell someone to start with that, what is the first key thing we should be doing? Are we on social media? Because I see that the trends today are authenticity and vulnerability. So how do we get across that we’re there with our expertise but we’re also authentic? It’s a bit of a catch-22 because we don’t want to look like we’re slumming around in our track suits but on the other hand, do people want someone who’s really looking always as if they’ve spent all day putting on their makeup? What do you think is the sweet spot between being authentic, vulnerable, and professional?
Kim: Well, I would say that one of the biggest things that I learned after coming out of corporate and starting my own business, I was so fearful that I had to do everything perfect and not necessarily be myself. I had to put on this persona of this corporate business because that’s how I was going to get clients, because that’s how I had always done it. It took me a while to realize that people wanted to know who I was, and I didn’t have to wait to have everything perfect to start helping other people.
So one thing is, figure out what you want to offer. What is the service that you are going to offer? What expertise do you have that you can help somebody with? So what is the service? That is the first thing that you need to know. And then second is, how are you going to show up and be in front of people and release some of that perfection – people want to know the real person. You’re going to show up in a way that is comfortable for you. For me, it might be that I want to have my nice suit on if that’s not me, but I’m using it as an example. And that makes me feel comfortable where somebody else might be doing more casual business, maybe they’re a filmmaker or something like that and they’re teaching people how to do film and they have a different persona that they’re going to show up as and they don’t have to have the same outfit. You’re going to know what’s authentic to you and how you should be showing up and how you want people to see you.
Caryl: And how do we get out there? You said you joined a community. Is making reels and TikTok or Instagram short form videos, which are really trending, is that the way we should package our intellectual property and who we are, or is there a better way?
Kim: There are so many ways to do it. And I’m not going to say that you have to do one particular thing. And I would say don’t lean on just things that are trending. Don’t take the advice of, oh, this is the next biggest thing and this is how you’re gonna get to your audience. You have to also do things that make you comfortable that you will do. So the biggest thing about visibility is what will you do and continue to do that is a place where you can share your knowledge and expertise in bite-sized formats or articles, presentations, there’s so many ways that we can get our brand in front of people and it’s not gonna be the same forever.
Caryl: What about you and me? Let’s look at us, I think we’re a bit different because I use podcasting to do that because I was a journalist and I’m a writer and I enjoy, I mean, books have changed my life. And I’m interested in why people write a book and how they write the book inside them as part of really who they are and put that out into the world. But I’m guessing that maybe your sweet spot is the Facebook group where you hold live Facebook interviews. Am I right? Could you maybe just differentiate someone like me who’s probably an introvert and that I like to stay at home and write and then show up and interview people for a short time.
Kim: Yes, one of the things that I use is I build a community. I want to bring people together that are like-minded and have similar problems and are looking for solutions. And in there, I’m the host, so I want to invite people into the story and share. I want to find out all about them. So I do live interviews in there. And that is how I work at growing my audience. But that is not the only thing. I also do other social media. I write articles. I will do webinars. I go on other people’s podcasts, like yours, Caryl, to share other people’s audiences. So I wanted to go and find people that I could bring value to their audience. And I also bring people in and have them on my show so that I do collaborations and partnerships. I find that’s really helpful.
Caryl: Yes. I think that’s how we actually cross paths. I think it was through the joint venture directory. I could see that perhaps, or we both could see, I could be exposed to your audience and you could be exposed to mine. And that’s how we met, even though it was a while ago, we eventually get together and do that. And so that’s what they call collaborative marketing, isn’t it?
Kim: Yes, yes.
Caryl: And as an author, with a small business of saving a practitioner or therapist or coach, this is one way to cross-pollinate with people who are in a different niche, ’cause you are not interested in teaching people in history how to write a book. But you have your skills, and I have mine, which is at the moment, you know, after my new book comes out, helping people use ChatGPT to write a client attraction book. And that will then leverage into other things, which as you say, is part of the brand. And what other things? I had some notes that I wanted to ask you some questions. In your book, Branding on a Shoestring, is there anything else that we can do on a shoestring? Facebook is obviously one of them because it’s pretty much shoestring if you don’t have to advertise. What else is top of mind today for people?
Kim: Social media, I believe it doesn’t have to be Facebook. Some people are, they really shy away from Facebook or they’re uncomfortable there. But I suggest that we can’t look a gift horse in the mouth. Social media, I think you need to have at least one platform that you show up on regularly. Maybe it’s LinkedIn and LinkedIn is becoming more of a social platform, but some place where you engage with people, that you share your information, and there’s some sort of back and forth with folks and conversation. There has to be a way that people reach out to you and you answer them.
And the next thing I would say is really important for everybody is to build an email list. And people need to consider that as something that’s really important. You can’t just have a life on social media. You have to start to own your own audience and get people that are interested in what you have. That means sharing some sort of gift. It could be a presentation, a podcast, a community group where you start collecting people’s emails. So email is almost a form of invisible payment, but it’s a very valuable currency. And what we want is to get those emails from people that trust us and want to know more from us. And what we can do with those emails is start to build that relationship because building a business and building a brand is about building relationships with people. And when people get to know you, they start to trust you more. They understand. It gives you that opportunity to really show who you are. That authenticity comes out and it doesn’t have to come across in five seconds because not everybody can know who you are in just a quick post. Sometimes people need to have a little bit more time and maybe they’re not quite ready to use your product or service right at the time.
Caryl: Thanks for that. So what is your product or service that you offer? Because when it boils down to, we need to earn a living doing what we love with our brand and branding. What is the best way to actually monetize our expertise in terms of our brand?
Kim: So I think there’s two questions there. So what do I do? My business is helping people to brand, develop the brand, strategize and market their message, create their message and build their marketing on that. That is what I have been doing for the last 15 years with small business owners. I do it in different ways. Mostly I started with one-on-one and then I do some courses and I do some group coaching, but it really boils down to, if you’re building a brand, you’re building a business and I help people to figure all of the little pieces out on how to get the word out, how to get in front of people.
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Caryl: Yes. I’ve noticed something that we haven’t talked about. That’s YouTube. You seem to have a YouTube channel that’s monetizing. Is it in a different way as an affiliate? Tell us about your YouTube channel.
Kim: Some of the things that we do in the Employee to Entrepreneur Society is to help people to also find various ways to start a business. Not everybody comes with an idea right away that they’re therapists or healers that they have a service already at hand. Some people want to start something completely new, but they’re not sure. I have done some research and I have an area in the community that’s all based on what I call side hustles and ways to start a business while you’re employed and work up to it.
One of the things that I started doing and really found could be lucrative, especially as you’re building your brand and you’re trying to figure out what your products and services are going to be. There’s still things that you know that you still have expertise and you can start building that personal brand authority. And you can be making money at the same time because you can start to share some of the things that you use in your business, in your life that have helped you in many ways. And that came about because I started to be an affiliate for things that I really believed in. Sometimes it was other types of coaches and I would share their programs and then I would get an affiliate fee for that. There’s all kinds of things that you can offer as an affiliate marketer to start making money with as you’re building your brand. I also found that there is a great opportunity for people to be an affiliate right away with the Amazon Influencer program. So I’ve been building that to help people understand how they can also build their own program, their own business, starting with affiliate marketing.
Caryl: That’s interesting because even I don’t know about that. Tell my audience about the Amazon influencer. Do you have to have a certain amount of followers to become part of that?
Kim: Yes, you do. So there is a qualifying entry. Amazon doesn’t give you exact numbers or anything like that, but they have to know that you are somebody that is online and has some sort of following and is going to stay online. So it’s not just a fly by night type of thing. They want people that are real and have some sort of knowledge. It took me a little bit to qualify for it, but not a lot. You can have a YouTube channel, you can have a Facebook or Instagram business page, or you can have a TikTok account. When you start, your social media doesn’t have to be supporting their products right away. You just have to have engagement on a topic in your social media. Then they’ll say that you can apply, and then there’s a few things to go through. But it’s quite a simple program once you get on, then you can be making money from videos that are one to two minutes long.
Caryl: That’s something you teach because the marketing side of me is thinking, “Well, Kim could do a little course on that.”
Kim: I do have a course on that, Caryl.
Caryl: Sorry. I do have a course on that. So where could people find that? I’d say that that could spark interest from authors who know a bit about making videos. Where can people find you and would it be to your website and then look for the program you have on that?
Kim: I can give you the link to that actual program. It’s called Creator for Profit and I’ll give you the link and you’ll be able to share that with your group.
Caryl: Right. Well, we can do that ourselves. Because that to me of the things we talked about sounds practical. There are a lot of things that are a bit nebulous for us trying to find our way. So let’s distill it down into the three things. You’ve mentioned, okay, building an email list, joining a community of people to support you and who understand that you’re a small business. That’s two things I picked up. What’s the third thing you think is absolutely crucial?
Kim: It’s finding a way to start making money so that you can actually be profitable and become a business and it’s not just something you’re doing as a hobby.
Caryl: Yes, yes. Well, thanks so much. So, Kim, do you have other than that program? Do you have an easy to remember website with your name? Where should people find you?
Kim: Well, they can reach me at my group, The Employee to Entrepreneur Society on Facebook, and I am also on LinkedIn as Kim Speed.
Caryl: Kim Speed, okay. So I think that’s enough to go to Facebook, look up Kim Speed, and if you can’t remember the whole of your group, it’s the Employee to Entrepreneur Society. And I look forward to being one of the people you interview in the not too distant future. But thanks for being on the podcast.
Kim: Yes, I’m excited for that, Caryl. I can’t wait.
Caryl: This is October. You never know when people are listening to this, but October 2024, as we head towards the end of the year, we’re connecting and sharing our expertise with people who want to make a living being who they are and sharing their expertise. Thank you for being on the podcast.
Kim: Thank you so much, Caryl.
[Outro]
Caryl: Thanks for joining me on today’s podcast. Want a free gift to inspire you further on your bookwriting adventure? My free checklist, five book hook tips to kickstart your bookwriting journey, will help you get clarity on the key essentials to make your book a winner. Download it at writethebookinsideyou.com/freegift. The links are in the show notes. Until next time, a big virtual hug and keep writing.